


Relief in the Size of Animals

by Ksumpter_mob



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Denial of Feelings, Imaginary Friends, Imagination, Jealous Gavin Free, Jealousy, Other, clumsy gavin, gavin free angst, gavin free thinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-11
Packaged: 2018-11-30 14:25:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11465445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ksumpter_mob/pseuds/Ksumpter_mob
Summary: Gavin has been lucky all his life.  Everything he ever wanted has always found a way to fall right into his lap.  But now Meg has officially quit Rooster Teeth.  Suddenly, there is one thing he wants more than anything--but he didn’t realize it until it was being taken from right before his own eyes.





	Relief in the Size of Animals

It wasn’t what Gavin expected to feel in the days that followed Meg leaving the Rooster Teeth building for the last time.  It certainly wasn’t something that he could admit to anybody.  But, there it was.

It was only a gnat when he and Meg climbed out of their car that Friday to go into her favorite Thai restaurant as a sort of celebration.

She laughed as she said it, sliding into the chair across from him at the table the maitre d had selected.  “A celebration.  It’s not like I won’t be seeing everyone,” she said.  “Michael and Lindsey are coming over for game night tomorrow, and Ryan and I are co-oping on some new Overwatch DLCs on Tuesday.  That’s fine, right?”

Of course, it was, and he said so immediately.  “Always up to see my boi,” he chirped, and thought, okay.  It’s because of that.  That’s what had made him so worried--that her leaving would make things...different.  That’s what put him in a bother.  But it wouldn’t change anything, though.  Everything was exactly the same.

The gnat swarmed and flipped around his head, and he shook his hair back to ward it off.  

By Monday, though, it had morphed into a mouse.  Not too noticeable really, but it popped up randomly and startled Gavin at the most inopportune times.

“Gavin!”  Michael’s tone of disbelief was echoed in the hysteria of the other Achievement Hunters as he accidentally flew his GTA V jet backwards into a mountain.  “How the _fuck_ did you do that?”  Gavin himself was squeaking too hard to answer, surreptitiously lifting his feet to keep the bugger from hopping back over his shoes and startling him again.

Later at the AH’s working lunch, he was unoccupied enough to anticipate the little vermin’s approach and watched as it scrambled into view and propped itself right at the front of his thoughts.

“Oi!”  It was hard to talk around the bite of the hoagie he had ordered.  “S’Been awhile since all six of us ate lunch together.”

Geoff snorted and griped, “Yeah, whose fault has that been?”

Gavin might have agreed over a year ago when he had been saddled with RT’s Creative Director role, but other than his standard holiday flights home and a few SloMo Guy shoots, he had been one of the more present AHs lately.  “Don’t look at me.  You’ve been out dead,” he retorted to Geoff.

Michael agreed.  “Yeah, Geoff and Ryan.  How’re you filling your days without Free Play?”

“You mean his nights?” Jack said, then covered his mouth in mock shock.  “I mean, oops!”  Ryan’s mouth was full, so he could only respond by mumbling threateningly.

Over the course of the next few days, the feeling grew imperceptibly.  One minute he was nudging the little rodent aside with his toe while he was viewing some old video he’d recorded on his phone; the next, as he was glancing at the time and realizing it was 8 o'clock, it was laying in wait on the back on his couch, propped up and ready to pounce.

He heard a noise and looked up as Turney entered the room, hands on hips.  “What’s up?”

She shrugged.  “Oh, nothing.  Ryan had to cancel our game time tonight.  His daughter wasn’t feeling well, so he’s gonna sit with her.”

“Oh, no.  That’s a shame.”  Gavin tapped his phone to pause the video; Dan’s agonized face froze in the image that would make any horror movie director proud.  “She got the flu or something?”

“He didn’t say.  He just sent me a text.”  Flopping down on the couch beside him, she wrapped her arms around his neck and nuzzled his goatee.  “You wanna do something?”

He leaned away from her teasingly.  “So I’m second choice to game time?”

“Well, sure!  Better than third choice or fourth choice.”

“What about first choice?”  He thought about that a little further.  “What if you only had an hour left on this earth.  What would you choose?  Sex with me or game time with Ryan?”

This earned him a lean back from Turney.  “Seriously?”

He knew it was a dumb question.  He knew the choice was obvious.  Still— “Are you gonna answer?”

She shook her head at him.  “You really know how to kill a mood, don’t you?”  

“It’s an honest question!”

Her eyes searched him, and he braced himself for a small sigh, a reproaching dismissal, a light jab that “Choice Three” (whatever it was) was looking pretty promising right about now.

But then something in her face softened.  Kissing him lightly on the cheek, she smiled. Nice and slow.  “You want an answer?  I’ll give you an answer.”  With one hand in his, she guided him to his feet and led him to their shared bedroom.

But not before, as they passed the home office, Gavin noticed that Meg had already turned on their computer, where the Dead by Daylight theme song hummed seductively from the speakers.  A pair of headphones dangled from the back of the office chair, and a fresh bottle of water stood tall and ready on the edge of the desk.

A mental shadow flashed before him, and Gavin stumbled against the side of the hallway before catching himself on the doorframe.  Assuring Turney that he was fine, he only needed a breath to search his brain and determine what it-- _it_ \--had become.

A cat.  It _had_ to become a cat.

They were like brothers, he and Ryan.  Lindsey had said so on an episode of Off Topic.  She was observant and smart, so it had to be so.  Gavin had straightened up in his seat at the observation, conscious of the unexpected warmth that had filled his chest.  

He was the eldest of three children, so he had never known what it meant to look up to someone else like--that.  Oh, there was Geoff — there was always Geoff — but Geoff was tattooed, alcohol-coated, heavy-eyed...Geoff.  And though they might have been brothers close in mental age, it wasn’t like having an older brother like Ryan.

When Ryan was originally considered for the open Achievement Hunter slot, Gavin had approached him like a med student would a 30-year member of a medical board of directors.  Knife-throwing, ten-dollar-word-speaking, on-camera masterminding, virtual murdering and chaos-ing...and yet, punctual to leave every day at 5 o’clock to be home with his beautiful wife and kids and gallons of pets.  Gavin couldn’t help but be intrigued.

He’d probed at the soft spots in Ryan’s armor, pressed at them, found weaknesses in the structure and proceeded to infest himself within.  Ryan’s speaking flubs, the rare moments when his scientific and historic facts were flawed, gave Gavin the chance to reveal just how important he was to Ryan’s existence.

And then, “Free Play” happened.

And then, Turney had that dream.

 

The little cat bastard turned into a warthog in the middle Million Dollars But!

“Cut!” Blaine repressed a smile of his own as Gavin burst out laughing.  “What the fuck happened?”

“Sorry, sorry.  I just had a random thought.”  Gavin waved it off, trying to stop giggling.  What a distracting, unprofessional thing to happen.  

Blaine raised his eyebrow, as did the two men sitting with Gavin around the small pub table.  “Do I want to know what it is?”

“Probably not,” Gavin grinned.

“Fair enough.  Okay, I think we’re good.  Thanks, guys.  I’ll let you know when the field shooting starts.”

Gus, one of the three attendees for this MDB episode, just shook his head at Gavin as he headed back to his office.

Ryan, shifting off his own bar stool, stared with lasered focus at Gavin.  “What were you looking at?”

“What?”

“You were watching something.  Something under your chair.”

“I was watching nothing.  I told you, I was thinking something.”  Gavin scoffed, “How can I watch a thought?”

“I mean — you can’t, but…you’ve always managed it somehow before.”

Gavin glanced over at him as they wandered off the MDB set, trying not to read too much into the jab.  “Should I take that as a compliment, Ryan?”

“You can take it however you want to sleep better at night.”

He loved open-ended statements.  “Thanks!  I will.”  Which reminded him.  “How’s your daughter?  Turn— I heard she wasn’t feeling too well.”

Ryan’s deadpan expression of cynicism melted beneath a gentle, warm smile and brightened eyes.  “She’s doing better, thank you.  I think it was just a stomachache from eating dinner too fast, but I didn’t want to take any chances.”

“Right.”  Gavin had always liked Ryan’s smiles.  He had different ones for different occasions, but his favorite was the one he reserved for people he cared deeply about.  “So, how did you soothe her?  Put her in a cage and force her to juggle knives?”

The smile dropped in exasperation, but Ryan played it off with characteristic, confused calm.  “No,” he drawled.  Then, he considered Gavin before a smirk tweaked one corner of his mouth.  “I played her a compilation of your bird noises.”

“You did not.”

“It’s true.  Put her right out.”

Gavin wrinkled his nose.  “Now you’re just having a laugh.”

Ryan shrugged.  “No more of a laugh than you were.  Put her in a cage…”

“I don’t know what sick habits you have at home.  We never talk about your family.  You’re always on with Tur—”  He stopped, took a deep breath.  “Maybe you talk about your family with others, but not with me,” he finished.

Again, Ryan glanced over at him with an air of quiet that made Gavin want to squirm.  “I didn’t know you cared that much about my family.”  He paused.  “Well, except for the occasional threat to proposition my wife.”

“Well, that’s different.  It’s like, we work so closely together, you and I, that sometimes I feel like she’s my wife, too.”

“I don’t think it works like that.”

“But it could, Ryan.   _That’s_ the point I’m trying to make.”

His blue eyes glinting under what little light there was, Ryan squinted at Gavin.  “I think I’m entitled to say this based on the information that you have so cogently just divulged to me.”

“Cog-wha—?”

“Don’t worry about it.  Sometimes, I am truly amazed that you can remember your own name, let alone know when you should and shouldn’t ever proposition another man’s wife.”

“Wait, what?” Gavin was indignant. “What’s that mean?  Course, I can remember my name!”

“Oh, yeah?  Say it.”

This had to be a trick.  Gavin remained silent as they passed through the kitchen space, gauging Ryan as the man gazed back, eyebrows raised.

“Holy shit, you did forget,” said Ryan.

“No, I didn’t forget my own name!”

“Then, just say it.  Say your own name, and I’ll consider talking about my family with you.”

“I’m not — Ryan — I’m not—”

Michael, who had been in the kitchen and joined them as they walked through, stared at Gavin in disbelief.  “Did you just call yourself ‘Ryan’?”

Ryan pointed.  “He did!  You heard it.”

By the time they had wandered into the Achievement Hunter office, Gavin was in a full fit of frustration, making every sound known to man and beast while Michael and Ryan struggled to hold themselves upright from laughing so hard.

“Heard you old married couple bickering all the way down the hall,” griped Geoff.  He added as Ryan passed him, “You haven’t teased Gavin this hard in months.”

Ryan, still chuckling, paused in reaching for the unopened Diet Coke can on his desk.  “What’re you talking about?  I tease him all the time.”

“I mean, he’s kinda right.  Geoff is,” interjected Michael.  “You’ll do it sometimes, but you haven’t been starting it lately.  And it’s not always kind.”  They paused their conversation to set up their screen and audio capture for a recording of a GTA V Things To Do that, according to Geoff, might or might not evolve into a full-length Monday release.  “Did something change in the last couple of weeks, to encourage the fun-loving banter of olden times?” Michael went on as a private version of Los Santos loaded on their monitors.  Beside his desk, Gavin could hear cloven feet shuffling against the papier-mâché of the Giant Nose.

“I don’t think so,” Ryan began slowly.  But Geoff, ever the opportunist, cast the final bait and caught it himself.

“I bet I know why.  It’s cuz the third wheel is gone!”  He hooted with laughter and, to punctuate his point, launched a rocket launcher at Gavin’s derpy GTA avatar.  “Now no one can get in the way of their crazy love affair!”

 

Gavin had hardly lifted his Xbox controller into his hands before the warthog, snorting and squealing, reared back on its stubby little hoofs, lunged forward, and struck the carpet hard behind his seat.  Its bristly back ballooned three, four, eight times its original girth until the new form sucked in a hearty breath and snorted revelations long and loud through its trunk.  He yelped; the controller squirted from his hands, and he scrambled to catch it before it hit his desk, or his coffee, or the keyboard, or the floor.  He failed; it hit every one and splattered into a spread of coffee stains, double A batteries, battery panel, and empty controller.

As he raced to collect everything under the blanket of chuckles and catcalls at his stupidity, he felt eyes watching him, observing him.  He didn’t dare look up to see whose they were.  The face cams, the video captures, the microphones--all of them were live, and he didn’t need his feelings recorded any more than they were.  Instead, he played “Gavin”--silly British git who called Geoff an ass for messing him up, stuffing the batteries back into his controller, and respawning his avatar to see how much damage had been done.

 

If the elephant had been real, it would have crushed the electronics under its feet as it climbed onto the collection of desks and paced impatiently over the computer towers, monitors, and gaming consoles.  Gavin gritted it teeth, tried to keep his head focused on the screen in front of him.

But Geoff had said what he had been trying to ignore, trying to avoid for the last week.  What he had thought he was the feeling, was wrong.  It wasn’t even trying to be discrete anymore.  

Meg was _gone_.  Gone from Rooster Teeth.  No more would she wander in during the middle of the Achievement Hunters filming a Let’s Play, sprawl on the couch, and check her texts and her Twitter feed while she waited for…

Who?  Gavin?

No.

While she waited for _him._

 

Waited for video capture to cut so she could walk with _him_ to the Free Play set.

Waited to stand up, stretch luxuriously, stroll to the office door, and watch as _he_ removed his headphones, rose without a glance behind him across the desks, and met her in the threshold.

Waited to tell _him_ new jokes along the way, showing _him_ pictures from her vlog and garner _his_ opinion on home improvement projects and listen to _him_ talk about _his_ pets and _his_ family.

Waited to hear _him_ laugh.  Waited to see _him_ smile that soft, warm, bright-eyed smile.

Waited to take Ryan away.

 

The elephant snorted and swung his trunk; Gavin ducked.

 

He was fine with Ryan having other endeavors.  That was none of his business.  He was a popular member of Rooster Teeth, let alone Achievement Hunters.  His schedule was expected to be filled.

But...when he went away...with _her…_

Geoff’s sigh resounded across the room as he tossed his headphones on his tabletop.  “Okay, dickwads.  Let’s take a fiver.  We’ve still got two vids to get in before lunch.”

“Whose idea was it to pack it in so tight?” Michael grumbled, but Gavin didn’t reply.  He needed air; he needed space--even if he knew what he was trying to escape was just going to follow him, anyway.

 

In the kitchen, Gavin pulled a fresh bottled water from the refrigerator.  When he turned, the elephant brayed over the kitchen island’s countertop, and he was forced to set the bottle down against the power of his rising thoughts.

He had been lucky all his life.  Everything that he had ever wanted--and more--had always managed to find a way to simply fall into his lap.  Despite his denial of otherwise, he knew it was the truth.  The luck of that first slow motion capture camera; the luck of renovating slow time in blockbuster films; the luck of landing at Rooster Teeth; and the luck of a beautiful, talented girlfriend who had pursued him.

But now, here was something--something he didn’t even know he’d needed--that had not simply fallen into his lap.  He’d had to work for it, worked to maintain it.  Just when he’d felt he’d had a hold on it, an understanding — it had almost been snatched from right under his nose.  

He gripped the edge of the counter, closing his eyes to block it out, but the elephant only howled louder, urging him to finish the thought.  The feeling reverberated through him, unrelenting, vibrating the veins in his temples and drying his throat to the point of swallowing every second.

_What do you want?_  He screamed inwardly against it.   _What is it?  Do you want me to admit it?  Do you want me to say it?_

The trumpeting increased, tripled tenfold, rattling the very world around him.

_Fine.  I’ll say it._

 

_...I’m glad she’s gone._

 

He squeezed his eyes tighter as his heart opened and accepted the shaming truth.

_It wasn’t fair.  I found him first.  I teased him first, I challenged him first.  I egged him on, and he responded.  We were like brothers; we were getting close.  We were getting to know each other, grow together.  Our relationship was the special one, not yours.  I deserve to see him every day, as long as I want, because that’s how it’s supposed to be._

_You can hang out with him; that’s fine.  You can talk to him, chat with him, have fun with him...but don’t.  Don’t take him away from me._

_...because._

_Because...because, he’s —_

“Mine,” he said, and opened his eyes to find his water gone, replaced across the island by a broad, retreating back.

Ryan turned around, glanced at him curiously as he adjusted his hold on the water bottle.  “I missed that.”  The elephant, billowing behind him, looked on.

Gavin’s chest tightened, and he cleared his throat to reverse the effects.  Glaring, he walked around to the front of Ryan and reached out his hand.  “I said—that’s mine.”

Ryan eyed him a moment, then looked down thoughtfully.  “Oh, yeah.”  Twisting the cap off, he chugged half before closing it and thumping it against Gavin’s chest.  “Thanks,” he said, and grinned.  It was wide, genuine grin, one that squeezed his eyes without eradicating them completely, so he could still tell that Ryan was looking at him.  It was a new smile, one Gavin couldn't remember seeing on him before.

Then it was gone, and Ryan was sauntering past him to the office.

 

Gavin stared at the bottle until the older man was out of sight, then jumped as the elephant honked and bounced excitedly onto the kitchen island.  It oozed over onto the floor and crowded the cabinets with its metaphorical mass.  If he indulged it any further, it might never leave.

His face cleared as he looked up into it.  Who knew; it might even grow wings and turn pink, and sit on cotton candy clouds blowing dandelion tufts.  If it was gonna hang around, it might as well be interesting.

He took a delicate sip of water, smacked his lips, and smiled.  “Come on, pal,” he said, and Luscious (cute name for an elephant) pranced after him. “Let’s get back to work.”

 

~ Fin ~

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed!


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